Merkel on 2020 climate target: “I’m working on making it happen”

Chancellor Angela Merkel said her government was still committed to reaching the country’s 2020 target to reduce emissions by 40 percent despite greenhouse gas emissions in Germany having increased. Asked if she thinks the government would succeed, Merkel said: “I’m working on making it happen, yes. We have committed to it.” In German broadcaster ARD’s town hall election campaign TV show, the chancellor added: “There’s still a lot to be done. Because we have advanced the energy transition relatively fast, we have a situation in which we export a lot of lignite power, for example to Poland. It’s still produced cleaner than maybe in the country itself. But, anyway, emissions have increased.” European climate goals were “not the problem”, said Merkel. “We already reach them.”

Watch the video in German here (from min. 30:42).

See the CLEW article Germany heads for "spectacular" 2020 climate target miss- study and the factsheet The story of “Climate Chancellor” Angela Merkel.